


Wistful

by CrumblingAsh



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Incredible Hulk - All Media Types
Genre: Brian Banner's A+ Parenting, Bruce Has Issues, Bruce Needs a Hug, Gen, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Interviews, Protective Avengers, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, Talk of Suicide, Written in a weird format, he doesn't know it but
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-06
Updated: 2015-11-06
Packaged: 2018-04-30 07:23:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5155229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrumblingAsh/pseuds/CrumblingAsh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><b>Interviewer: </b>[smiling] Yes, the Hulk costumes were quite popular, right beneath the Captain America ones. But, with the things that came out in the release of the SHIELD files about yourself, do you really believe it’s a good thing for children to see you as some sort of role model?</p><p><b>Bruce:</b> Um ... [pauses, blinks heavily] I’m sorry, what things are we talking about? We’re not talking about the Hulk?</p><p><b>Interviewer:</b> [looking at his notes] No. Information about you was buried deep in a multitude of other tidbits of scandalous information, but it was there. We’re talking about your documented attempts of suicide.</p><p><b>Bruce:</b> ... Ah.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wistful

* * *

 

 

 **Interviewer:** Doctor Banner, despite what you refer to as your “condition”, you have come to be seen as a hero to many people; especially to children.

 

 **Bruce:** [chuckling sheepishly] I...yeah. It’s probably not the best thing, with the Hulk and his ...origins and all, but ... yeah. I saw the Halloween costumes this year.

 

 **Interviewer:** [smiling] Yes, the Hulk costumes were quite popular, right beneath the Captain America ones. But, with the things that came out in the release of the SHIELD files about yourself, do you really believe it’s a good thing for children to see you as some sort of role model?

 

 **Bruce:** Um ... [pauses, blinks heavily] I’m sorry, what things are we talking about? We’re not talking about the Hulk?

 

 **Interviewer:** [looking at his notes] No. Information about you was buried deep in a multitude of other tidbits of scandalous information, but it was there. We’re talking about your documented attempts of suicide.

 

 **Bruce:** ... Ah.

 

 **Interviewer:** The first few date back to when you were thirteen, Doctor Banner - some of your most ... significant ones appear to have occurred before the creation of the Hulk.

 

 **Bruce:** ... That’s correct. In fact, uh, assuming you’ve got the pages I think you do, then [fidgets a little] it’s all correct.

 

 **Interviewer:** It’s all correct? There are _twenty-two_ documented attempts that are listed on here, Doctor Banner.

 

 **Bruce:** Documented, yes.

 

 **Interviewer:** [leaning forward] So you’re saying that you’re suicidal?

 

 **Bruce:** We can use that term, sure. In that, there are times I want to die, and there are times I try to die, and if someone came up to me and promised that they’d be able to kill me, I would more than likely let them.

 

 **Interviewer:** And do you believe that it’s alright for children to idolize someone who wants to and has tried to kill themselves?

 

 **Bruce:** I don’t think that’s what they like about the Hulk, actually-

 

 **Interviewer:** Do you believe that looking up to a man who does such a thing will only make more kids want to do try killing themselves as well?

 

 **Bruce:** \- and that’s not how it works.

 

 **Interviewer:** Doctor Banner-

 

 **Bruce:** Look. I think you’re fishing for an apology, or an excuse, or a lesson, and, I’m really sorry, but I can’t give you one.

 

 **Interviewer:** You’re proud of-

 

 **Bruce:** Sometimes ... sometimes life is beyond hard. It’s beyond something you feel you’re capable of surviving. Sometimes, being alive is very ... _not easy_. You and the rest of the world have access to my files, so you know. My father **_hated me_** in the way you shouldn’t hate anyone, and was abusive to the point of what would be considered torture, in a war. What isn’t documented are the four times I tried to kill myself between the ages of eight and twelve, because I believed myself to be a waste of space, or a monster, or responsible for the bruises that started showing up on my mom, too. They all failed, obviously. My father killed my mother in front of me not soon after my last attempt, and I lived with him for a year before the police found out and he was arrested for it. I tried to drown myself in the bathtub during that year - also not noted - and only failed because he found me and almost did it himself. After he was arrested, I was put into the system, and I couldn’t really ... think. For a year the worst I did was claw at myself with my fingernails just to feel something, because my mother was dead and my father wasn’t there and it was like I didn’t exist.

 

 **Bruce:** And then, after that year was up, my aunt took me in. My aunt, who had a perfect husband and a perfect daughter and that kind of perfect family that families are supposed to be. Suddenly I existed again, but in the wrong place, with the wrong people, in the wrong life. I was in the way again, I was a mistake, an ink splatter on a perfect letter that needed to be erased. So you’ll see that the first “documented attempt” matches the timeline of when I moved in there. Seven more of them fit within the time frame that I lived there.

 

 **Interviewer:** You wanted to kill yourself, Doctor Banner, even though you were with a loving family?

 

 **Bruce:** It doesn’t work like what you think, you know. It doesn’t just shut off because things suddenly get better. I mean, I’m sure it does for some people, but it’s really different for everyone. I was raised to believe I was bad, that I was only going to hurt people. I could hear those words in my head every single day. I felt them in my scars, in places were bruises had been long since faded. Sometimes, I would wake up just thinking “today is the day I’m going to die”, and hate myself so badly that I’d try it. I saw a therapist; I actually saw a few. Not one of them could get into my head and remove all of that from me and make me believe that I wasn’t a monster.

 

 **Interviewer:** You should have gone on medication, you should have-

 

 **Bruce:** You can’t help people who don’t want to be helped. And I didn’t want help.

 

 **Interviewer:** And that’s the lesson you want to teach to the youth of today. That this is all okay? That if you don’t want help, you’re fine and shouldn’t take it?

 

 **Bruce:** That’s not what you really want to know. [smiles] Right now, you’re thinking about how I should be locked up and away from everyone and forgotten. Because if people forget me, if I don’t “exist” for them, then maybe it’ll keep other people from killing themselves. But that’s not how it works. Hiding away the evidence of a problem doesn’t make the problem go away, make them stop. There are thousands - millions - of people out there who want to die. Who think they don’t deserve to live. People who have never even _heard_ of my “documented attempts” want to end their lives. You can’t _catch_ suicidal tendencies. You develop them. So no, I’m not going to apologize or spout off a lesson about why it’s wrong - people hear it every day, and it just makes things worse. I’ll say to those people to please not, because I like you, and I want to meet you, and I want to see what you can do in this world. I’ll say to those people, fuck anyone who tells you that you don’t matter - do _they_ even matter? Do you even like that person as a person? Really? And I’ll also say - that I get it. I understand what it’s like to be there. I won’t say not to do it, because that’s hypocritical. I’ll _ask_ you not to, because I mean it when I say that I really want to see what you can do on this planet. I want to _hear you_.

 

 **Interviewer:** Doctor Banner-

 

 **Bruce:** [gets up] [smiles again] I think this interview is over.

 

* * *

 

 

 

Bruce finds the team waiting for him in the back room, each standing there with their practiced blank faces, watching him carefully as if determining what he wants. He approaches slowly, unsure of their reactions - they know all of it, of course they do. They’re his friends, strange as it still sounds.

But they’ve never talked about it. Not like that. Not in any sort of detail.

It’s Tony, thumbs flying over the screen of his phone, who breaks first.

“So, your last test came out negative,” the billionaire blurts out like it’s news Bruce hasn’t been expecting. He doesn’t look up at Bruce as he talks. “Cells were damaged for like, five seconds, but then bounced back in a pulse violent enough to crack the machine. The cells, Brucie. The _cells_ cracked the machine.”

Bruce winces, picturing the mess that’s in the lab. “Sorry,” he says sincerely, wringing his hands. “I’ll ... buy a new one- _oof_.”

“Thor, man, your strength,” Clint warns from off to the side – Bruce can’t see him from where he’s held into Thor’s chest. The warmth feels nice; he hadn’t even realized there had been approaching headache until the Asgardian’s heat had seeped into his neck, pushing it off.

“I’m sorry,” Thor responds, though he doesn’t let go until seconds later.

Natasha steps forward then, studying him critically from head-to-toe through narrowed eyes before flicking a finger against his curls. “He’s alright.” She looks over his shoulder to Tony. “Are you handling it, Stark?”

“Duh.”

“Handling what?” Bruce wonders aloud as Clint walks over to bump their shoulders together.

“Secret manic spy stuff,” the archer whispers loudly, waggling his eyebrows. “Or, just secret manic stuff. Or … secret stuff? Stark’s not a spy. He ain’t got the stealth.”

“Bite me, Katniss.”

“Suck me, can-opener.”

“…What?”

“Children.” Steve is smiling, hands in his pocket as his blue eyes dart between the group and the door that blocks them from the studio full of people Bruce is pretty sure he’s just pissed off. “Why don’t we continue this extremely mature discussion somewhere else, like the Tower? Over pizza?”

“ _Pizza_ ,” Clint agrees enthusiastically, nudging at Bruce again before darting toward the back exit, Tony completely forgotten to him. It’s a fire exit. “I want two with _everything_.”

“You can have _one_ ,” Natasha counters, following. She does something to the door bar, and when she pushes it open, the alarm stays quiet. Thor, laughing, races forward to go through first.

Bruce watches them, feeling a snake of confusion worm up his spine even as he shakes his head. “Are we really not going to talk about it?” He asks to no one in particular. “What I said out there? No one’s curious?”

Steve’s arm, heavy and just as warm as Thor’s, lands gently across his shoulder. It doesn’t pull him in, or move him at all. Bruce looks up to see his captain still smiling, looking down at him with a strangely free expression. “We’ll talk about it if and when you want to talk about it,” he says firmly, squeezing just a little. His smile dims a little, a frown twitching along his face. “What happened out there-.”

“Shouldn’t have happened,” Tony finishes. His phone is suddenly gone, and unlike Steve, he burrows into Bruce’s side, hooking his arm around Bruce’s waist with enough strength that Bruce shifts a little.

Steve moves easily with him. “There were thousands and thousands of pages about the atrocities and horrors that Hydra committed through the hand of the US government,” the blonde grumbles, “and they chose to dig into and exploit _your_ past. With no permission from or even a warning for you about it. It wasn’t right. We’re not going to do that to you, Bruce. We’ll talk if and when you want to talk, and not before.”

“Except-.” Tony is urging the three of them forward to where Natasha is propping the door open – outside of it, Bruce can see the waiting limo running quietly in the parking garage, Happy at the wheel. Waiting. “To tell you that while we’re not going to get you any of that help you don’t want-.”

“I appreciate that,” Bruce says dryly, and Steve snorts.

“We’re going to give you reasons.”

“Reasons?” Neither Tony nor Steve let him go to get through the door; they have to turn sideways to make it, and Natasha gives them a rare smile of amusement at the fact.

He doesn’t receive an answer until Steve is sliding into the car and Tony is lightly shoving him in after, when he can’t see the genius’ face. It's soft, wistful, almost as if Tony doesn't really intend for him to hear it.

“To stick around.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by [this tumblr post](http://enjolrras.tumblr.com/post/132568389484/sickfake-being-alive-is-verynot-easy)


End file.
